|
 |   |
EVENTS Fantasy Central Inside Game Multimedia Central Statitudes Your Turn Message Boards Email Newsletters Golf Guide Cities Work in Sports
CNNSI.com GROUP
COMMERCE
|  |
Golden aim for Ullrich
BERLIN, Sept 1 (AFP) - He may be a product of the former all-conquering East German sporting system, but cyclist Jan Ullrich will be carrying the hopes of all of Germany when he bids for gold in both the road race and the time trial. The time trial is the more likely path to the gold for Ullrich who excels in the discipline and won the World Championship last year in Italy. At 26 Ullrich has already amassed a glittering series of prizes none more so than his landmark victory in the 1997 Tour de France, a victory that has seen cycling boom as a sport in Germany. He lay the foundation for that victory the year before in 1996 when he really emerged. It was his unselfish work that provided the platform for his Deutsche Telekom team-mate - Denmark's Bjarne Riis - to clinch victory. That left Ullrich as favourite for the next running and he did not disappoint. Like all Tour winners he is an all-rounder - a good road racer, a solid performer in the mountains and excellent in the time-trial which can often see a rider lose or gain minutes against their rivals. That versatility saw home the red-headed Rostock-born rider as he clinced victory on the Champs Elysees. His progress was interrupted by the 1998 Tour when the race disintegrated into farce as drugs finds, police raids and tearful tantrums turned the race into a fiasco. The fact that Ullrich started out in the East German system - since revealed to be based on systematic doping - and was part of a sport where drug misuse is rife led many to point the finger at the German. But he has never failed an official dope test and took legal action against a German newspaper that accused him and his Telekom team-mates of misconduct. Like many top riders he gave the 1999 Tour a miss but it was by no means an unproductive year for the German as he triumphed in the Vuelta (Tour of Spain) - with the Tour and the Giro d'Italia (Tour of Italy) one of the three big races in the sport. This year he returned to the Tour and performed creditably although he had to settle for second spot behind runaway American winner Lance Armstrong. This year's race took a brief detour into Germany to the Black Forest town of Freiburg - Ullrich's adopted base - in honour of the German. Organisers even ensured that the time-trial stage would start in Freiburg before finishing over the border in Mulhouse, France but sadly Ullrich could not please his home supporters and had to settle for runners-up spot in the stage behind Armstrong. Ullrich is now ranked second in the world while his Texan sparring partner is sixth. But few dispute that Armstrong is the main obstacle to gold.
|
